Decembers of the Past

Ned Kehde

Since 2011, we have published 60,125 words about how, when, and where Midwest finesse anglers catch black bass in December at various kinds of waterways in Arkansas, Indiana, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, North Carolina, Texas, and West Virginia by employing Midwest finesse tactics.

Ice-covered reservoirs and wintery weather can make it difficult for Midwest finesse anglers to get afloat in northeastern Kansas in December. What’s more, it can be a struggle for us to catch largemouth bass, smallmouth bass, and spotted bass. For example, we were afloat four times at our cold-water reservoirs and once at a power-plant reservoir in 2007. In 2008, we were afloat five times at our cold-water reservoirs. In 2009, we were afloat twice at our cold-water reservoirs and twice at one of our two power-plant reservoirs. In 2010, we were afloat six times at our cold-water reservoirs and once at a power-plant reservoir. In 2011, we were afloat eight times at our cold-water reservoirs and three times at a power-plant reservoir. In 2012, I was recovering from a broken wrist and hand, and we were afloat only once at a cold-water reservoir and once at a power-plant reservoir. In 2013, we were afloat at our cold-water reservoirs once, and twice at a power-plant reservoir. In 2014, we were afloat four times on our cold-water reservoirs and once at a power-plant reservoir. In 2015, we fished on Dec. 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 11, 18, and 23, and all of those outing were at our cold-water reservoirs. On these nine outings, we struggled to catch 158 largemouth bass and inadvertently tangled with 23 rainbow trout in 28 hours and 45 minutes of fishing.

Of course, the weather and the fishing is different in other locales across the nation. The many words at the following links will reveal how Midwest finesse anglers in Kansas and elsewhere deal with fishing in December.

(7) We noted that the largemouth bass fishing can be trying in December, but this story about largemouth bass fishing in Decemeber, which we have written about several times, needs to be told again and again. So here it is again:

On Dec. 9, 2010, we helped Stacey King of Reeds Spring, Missouri, create a feature about Midwest finesse fishing for “The Bass Pros” television show.

King is a veteran and hall-of-fame angler, who has competed on the Bassmaster, FLW, and scores of other circuits for decades. And after we helped him create a feature for “The Bass Pros” television show, he became a Midwest finesse aficionado.On this December day, King and I were afloat at a suburban community reservoir in the Kansas City metropolitan area. The surface temperature ranged from 38 to 40 degrees, and several acres of ice covered the back end of the reservoir’s primary feeder-creek arm.

To King’s and the cameraman’s delight, they captured enough largemouth-bass-catching footage for the feature in 3 1/2 hours. During that spell we caught 38 largemouth bass, including three lunkers. According to King, it often takes two days of fishing to garner enough footage for a TV show. But for some miraculous reason, we accomplished this feat in record time on a December day in northeastern Kansas by employing Midwest finesse tactics. And it is unlikely that this achievement will ever occur again – especially at this community reservoir, which has been waylaid by the largemouth bass virus, and it is also plagued by heavy predation by anglers.